Illinois River Flood Essays

Floating the Floodplain:  A June Gift 

For a couple of days it looked like Sunday’s weather (June 30, 2013) would be a gift.  And when Sunday arrived, the predictions, for a change, proved true:  cool and sunny, with a strong breeze from the north.  So I wasted little time before dragging my canoe to the water’s edge at Quiver Lake, a backwater of the Illinois River near Havana.  I needed at once to take advantage of this fine early morning.  Because as the day wore on, winds would increase, always a problem for a canoeist; temperatures would rise; and the river would become busy with recreational boaters.

Aerial photo of the Havana area, about 40 miles southwest of Peoria 

Another reason this day was a gift was because the river was still in flood, as it had been since April; the river, in fact, broke its 1943 high-water record on April 25.  And although it had gone down quite a bit, I suspected that I could still canoe through the flooded forests, which lay between Quiver Lake and the river, and then cross over the river to the Thompson Lake levee, which separates the floodplain beyond from the river.  As I paddled against the increasing north winds, I could just barely hear a towboat-barge chugging upriver, and I imagined its powerful diesel engines driving a massive propeller, leaving behind a turbid, foaming wake.  That’s where I was heading now, about a mile to the west.  But first I needed to cross Quiver Lake and, hopefully, its surrounding forest.

Boathouse at Quiver Lake at the height of the 2013 flood    

I quickly made it to the levee that forms the southern boundary of Chautauqua National Wildlife Refuge at the head of Quiver Lake.  The water in the refuge was higher than Quiver Lake and just barely poured over the levee’s spillway.  Snowy egrets foraged on the spillway, occasionally grabbing small fish from the cascading flood waters.  Part of me wanted to stay and watch the egrets, and to see what other birds were at the refuge, but I felt like the morning was slipping away.  And so, I paddled onward, anxious and regretful at the same time.

As I entered the deep shade of the floodplain forest at Chautauqua Refuge’s southwest corner, I could see continuous water all the way to the Illinois River.  At 15.9 feet, the river was about a foot over the forest floor, allowing more than enough depth for my canoe.  As I negotiated around trees, floating logs, and other debris, the forest came alive with bird song.  Highlights included the prothonotary warbler, warbling vireo, Carolina wren, American redstart, red-headed woodpecker, pileated woodpecker, and the strange clucking-like “song” of the yellow-billed cuckoo.  Surrounded by every shade of green imaginable, I felt as if I were in some ancient southern swamp, where it still might be possible to see the rare ivory-billed woodpecker, as some have claimed in recent years.  I wanted to linger, but the wind in the forest canopy and a fast-moving John boat on the river reminded me to move along.

At the edge of the forest, I slowly floated out into the river, looked up- and downriver and saw no one.  Even in the river’s main channel, the current was slight, despite flood conditions.  But I paddled hard and fast, not wishing to be caught in the open water if a swift cruiser or bass boat should make its way around the river bend.  I was also concerned about the river’s famous “jumping” Asian carp, which can grow very large and heavy.  I’ve had these slimy, bleeding, highly energetic, flapping fish jump into my canoe before, and it was not a pleasant experience, for me or the fish.  So when I soon reached the Thompson Lake levee, I was a bit relieved.

Here I beached the canoe and climbed the levee, perhaps 10 to 15 feet above the river.  Before me an extensive cattail marsh, with small patches of open water, stretched for about 5 miles.  The recently restored Thompson Lake was beyond the marsh, and beyond that, about 2 miles away, the Fulton County bluffs.  This entire area, which was a highly productive farm up until the early 2000s, is now referred to as the Emiquon Nature Preserve.

I soon found a place to sit on the levee high above the marsh, unpacked my breakfast, and simply observed the scene before me.  I had dreamed about doing this very thing ever since my wife Julie and I purchased a cabin on Quiver Lake two years ago, but until this recent flood the river had not been high enough to make it through the forest in a canoe.  I thought again about how this day was a gift.

With my binoculars I saw several dead trees, which could not survive within the restored waters of Thompson Lake, with double-crested cormorants on each branch, and what looked like cormorant nests.  In the air I saw several American white pelicans attempting to find rising air columns for soaring.  Red-winged blackbirds were the most common bird in the marsh.  And while I listened to common yellowthroats and a calling least bittern, a black-crowned night heron emerged from the cattails, and flew out of sight to the southwest.  Before too long, the least bittern also emerged from the cattails for only a few seconds, flew past, and quickly disappeared again.  As far as I knew, it never appeared in the open again during my visit.  The phrase “being in the right place at the right time” came to mind.

By 10:30, I realized it would not be long before more boaters and personal watercraft would be on the river.  And as I tend to like a quiet river, I usually leave well before they are active.  So with a satisfied mind, I quickly re-crossed the Illinois River, glided through its floodplain forests, and entered Quiver Creek, just below Chautauqua Refuge’s water-control structure.  The snowy egrets were gone from the spillway and replaced by a pack of turkey vultures, standing ghoul-like with their red skinheads, watching me with nervous side glances.  The wind and current quickly carried me into Quiver Lake, and I rode the white-capped waves like a surfer, hardly paddling, all the way home to my sandy beach and cabin.  I would savor this gift of a day for a long time.

 

The Dynamic Illinois River

 [This essay originally appeared in the online Pekin Daily Times in May 2012, a year in which Illinois experienced a severe drought.]

One week ago the Illinois River was still high from a moderate flood event that inundated most of the lower-lying areas, including bottomland forests.  But the peak was short lived, and the river had gradually begun to fall.  Between last Wednesday and Friday, though, its level precipitously dropped four feet before somewhat stabilizing.

I know when the river level has changed because at my cabin along Quiver Lake, north of Havana, it is easy to see when the lake level has changed, even in small amounts.  Also, Quiver Lake is connected to the Illinois River, and whatever happens to the river, happens to Quiver Lake.

What I have seen, which is well known, is that the lake level and the river are usually in a constant state of flux.  Obviously, a large amount of rain upstream will eventually cause the river and Quiver Lake to rise.  But the river’s level will also change when the navigation dams at Peoria and below Beardstown have their gates opened or closed.  When the operators close the gates in Peoria, for example, due to falling river levels upstream, the river level below the dam drops; the water level drops in Quiver Lake sometime thereafter.  Just the opposite occurs when the gates are opened.  It’s all part of a plan to manage the river for boat traffic and towboat-barges, which need at least a nine-foot depth.

River users must adapt.  Fish adapt to these changes by moving into or out of backwaters connected to the river.  Birds also adapt:  when the river drops, waterbirds, such as ducks and double-crested cormorants, move elsewhere, because mud flats may have replaced their open-water habitats.  But shorebirds will be attracted to the mudflats…until the river rises again.

For the next few days, the Illinois River is projected to continue a gradual fall.  So mud flat habitats will continue to increase.  If that trend continues long enough, much of Quiver Lake will eventually become a mosaic of mudflats and small pools too shallow even for a canoe; Quiver Creek, which feeds into the upper end of Quiver Lake, will then become a more important source of water for the lake. 

Before that happens, though, it is much more likely that the river will experience one or more short-duration floods, like the last few weeks, before settling into its normal summer low period, the only time it is ever really close to being “stable.”  Exactly what will happen and when, no one can say.  One thing I do know for certain is that the Illinois River will eventually rise again.  At my cabin, I’ll be watching.

 

An Illinois River July Rise

 [This essay originally appeared in the online Pekin Daily Times in July 2012.]

Earlier in the week, I had read that northern Illinois experienced some very active thunderstorms and had actually received quite a bit of rain in some areas.  This, I knew, would eventually affect downstream rivers.  And so I was not surprised to see the National Weather Service’s forecast, which showed that the Illinois River in my part of central Illinois would rise about a foot between July 19 and 21.

Previous to this point in time, the Illinois River and its connected backwaters, such as Quiver Lake, had been at a stable, low level for weeks.  The lake at its upper end, near Chautauqua National Wildlife Refuge, in fact, held only a trickle of water delivered by Quiver Creek; and mud flats had been exposed long enough for lush vegetation to grow.

Quiver Lake in 2012 during a drought year

So not having been to my Quiver Lake cabin for a few days, I was anxious Saturday morning (July 21) to see the lake’s condition.  How much would the lake have risen along with the river?  And what else would I find?

As soon as I arrived at the cabin, looking out on the lake from the bluff top, it was immediately obvious that the lake had risen as expected.  But it was not deep enough to prevent great blue herons and great egrets from standing in the shallows, watching for small fish to catch in their spear-like bills.  So without delay, I readied my spotting scope and binoculars and headed down the bluff side to the lakeshore.

On the way I noticed a strange splashing sound coming from the lake, sounding very much like someone washing clothes (the sound reminded me of the old semi-manual washing machine that my grandmother once used in the early 1960s).  The sound seemingly came from everywhere in the lake at once.

When I emerged from the trees at the base of the bluffs, I could see that the splashing sound came from large fish spasmodically moving about all over the lake, even in the marsh vegetation over newly flooded bottomlands.  I had witnessed this phenomenon many times:  when the river rises, fish move into the backwaters from the river and sometimes engage in spawning if conditions are favorable.  All of the fish that I could see, though, were very large common carp, a species that is not native to North America and which tends to thrive in polluted waters where other species cannot live.  Most people consider the common carp undesirable.   

Though Quiver Lake appeared to be wall-to-wall carp, it is almost unreal to think that they were once apparently even more numerous.  In 1908, for example, 24 million pounds of fish were harvested from the Illinois River; and of the total catch, about two thirds were common carp (see Man’s Effect on the Fish and Wildlife of the Illinois River, published in 1966 as Illinois Natural History Survey Biological Notes No. 57, by H.B. Mills, W.C. Starrett, and F.C. Bellrose).

(It is interesting to note that the 24-million-pound statistic has often been cited in recent years to laud the great capacity that the river and its backwaters once had for producing fish biomass.  The carp component of that statistic, however, is usually overlooked.)

Still, Quiver Lake on Saturday, with its fresh, green marsh vegetation, blue skies, brown sandy beaches, and distant forested bluffs in Fulton County, was a scene of beauty.  It made me glad to live in central Illinois near the river.

[Note:  These essays also appeared in the Spring 2014 issue of Illinois Audubon magazine, pages 16-18.]

 

More Illinois River stories can be found in my book Side Channels published in 2011.

Comments

[Brooke]

Thank you so much for the essay. I got assigned to do an essay on flooding to this is perfect. If you want I can post other flood essays I found as well: Flood Essay

[Tom]

It's one of my favorite things to do around here. And it's a rare experience. Only when conditions allow.

[Catherine Hackman]

Although I can't swim and am afraid of the water, I would very much enjoy a canoe ride in early morning through the trees. I often try to imagine what this land looked like when the first people saw it. Canoeing like that would be kind of like going back in time.